2007 U.S. Daylight-Saving Time (DST) Extension

VMware has produced an update for the following products affected by the new United States daylight-saving time (DST) change:

• VMware ESX Server 2.x
• VMware ESX Server 3.0.x

The update has been incorporated into the following product releases:

• VMware ESX Server 2.0.2 Upgrade Patch 3 (build 33518 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 2.1.3 Upgrade Patch 3 (build 33524 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 2.5.3 Upgrade Patch 5 (build 34512 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 2.5.4 and later (build 32233 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 3.0.0 and later (build 27701 or later)
• VMware ESX Server 3.0.1 and later (build 32039 or later)

The ESX Server downloads pages are at:

• http://www.vmware.com/download/esx/ (for ESX Server 2.x)
• http://www.vmware.com/download/vi/ (for ESX Server 3.x)

Checking an ESX Server host for installed updates:

[root@esxhost]# vmware -v
VMware ESX Server 2.5.1 build-14182

1. Check that the zoneinfo file for the ESX Server host location has the correct changes reflecting the new DST dates:
   
   [root@esxhost]# zdump -v /usr/share/zoneinfo/<specific zoneinfo file> | grep 2007
   
   
2. Compare the output from step 1 to what is currently in /etc/localtime:
   
   [root@esxhost]# zdump -v /etc/localtime | grep 2007
   
   
3. If the output from /etc/localtime is not correct, copy the specific zoneinfo file from /usr/share/zoneinfo to /etc/localtime.
   
   [root@esxhost]# cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/<specific zoneinfo file> /etc/localtime
   
   If prompted to overwrite /etc/localtime, type yes.
   
   
4. Check that /etc/localtime has the correct DST timezone dates.
   
   [root@esxhost]# zdump -v /etc/localtime | grep 2007
   
   
5. After updating /etc/localtime, you must reboot the ESX Server host so that all system logger services will use the correct date and time in log output files. Shut down or suspend any running virtual machines, and then reboot the host.
   

The update package for ESX 2.0.2, 2.1.3, 2.5.0, 2.5.1, 2.5.2 and 2.5.3 is available in the attached gziped tarfile tzdata-new.gz :

1. Download the tar file and save it as tzdata-new.gz in the /tmp directory on the service console.
   
   
2. Extract the tar file in /tmp:
   
   [root@esxhost]# cd /tmp
   [root@esxhost]# tar zxvf tzdata-new.gz
   
   
3. Check /etc/sysconfig/clock to ensure the ESX Server host is configured for the correct timezone location:
   
   [root@esxhost]# cat /etc/sysconfig/clock
   
   Sample output:
   
   ZONE="America/Los_Angeles"
   UTC=true
   ARC=false
   
   If the line for ZONE= is not correct, edit /etc/sysconfig/clock to replace the string with the correct zone from /usr/share/zoneinfo.
   
   
4. Execute the perl script to install the time zone files:
   
   [root@esxhost] # /tmp/time-zone/tz-update.pl
   
   
5. Follow the steps in Confirming timezone updates contain new DST data (above) to verify /etc/localtime reflects the changes.
   
   
6. Shut down or suspend any running virtual machines then reboot the ESX Server host so that all system logger services will be refreshed to use the correct date and time in log output files.